Last Thursday at a hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, the EPA Administrator said that a decision on how EPA would review and grant small refinery exemptions (SREs) would come within “days, not weeks.” The clock is ticking. The review is being driven by a decision of the 10th Circuit Federal Court of Appeals in Denver which ruled that EPA went beyond its authority in granting three different small refinery exemptions (SREs) in 2016 and 2017. As we reported on 28 January… Under the decision, the Court ruled that none of the three refineries consistently received an SRE prior to their 2016 exemption petitions, so the EPA had exceeded its authority to grant extensions of the SREs “b...
Forecasting developments in production agriculture
On behalf of a private U.S. agricultural technology provider, WPI’s team generated an econometric model to forecast the movement of concentrated corn production north and west from the traditional U.S. Corn Belt. WPI’s model has subsequently provided quantitative support to a multi-million-dollar investment into short-season corn variety development. WPI’s methodology included a series of interviews with regional grain elevators and seed consultants. Emphasizing outreach and communication with stakeholders who possess intimate sectoral knowledge – on-the-ground insights – is a regular component of WPI’s methodologies, made possible by WPI’s ever-growing network of industry contacts.